


Nagaraja

by datfearlessfangirl



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Deceit Sanders is a Sweetheart, Deceit is Indian, Indian Character, Logan is black, M/M, Multi, Prom, also intruality woooh
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-12-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:47:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23934049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/datfearlessfangirl/pseuds/datfearlessfangirl
Summary: Ever since sophomore year, Deepak Srinivas had a crush on his best friend Remus Mendez's twin brother, Roman. His hopes are crushed when Roman starts dating Logan Harris, but Dee quickly finds himself falling for the sweet nerd too.Meanwhile, Remus and Patton are an odd couple and are determined to get these three idiots together through any means necessary
Relationships: Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders/Logic | Logan Sanders/Deceit Sanders, Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders/Morality | Patton Sanders
Comments: 46
Kudos: 66





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> My first Sanders Sides fic! Hopefully, you guys like it! It's been really fun to write.

_**Tuesday, March 27. Two weeks before prom** _

The cafeteria was loud, full of energy that Deepak didn’t have the resolve to deal with. He plopped down into the seat next to Virgil, who barely paid him any mind beyond a small wave. Remus didn’t seem to be anywhere nearby, and Deepak had yet to decide whether that was a bad thing.

Apparently his distaste was evident, because beside him Virgil drawled, “You look like a real ray of sunshine. Rough day?”

Dee simply nodded his head, picking at his rice and ignoring the urge to mutter “kinky”. Clearly, Remus was rubbing off on him. In all honesty (something he struggled with on a daily basis), the day had been more than just rough. His first two classes were with Patton Simmons, and he was nice enough, if not a bit too overly happy about everything. Today, however, he would not shut up about his boyfriend and how wonderful he was. It wouldn’t have bothered Dee as much had Patton not asked him whether he had anyone to go to prom with. He really didn’t care about prom one way or the other, and even if he planned to go, he didn’t have anyone who pitied him enough to be his date. So he simply answered no, and felt his blood boil when Patton fixed him with that pitying look.

If he didn’t already not want to go to prom, this finalized his decision.

“Guess who’s gonna get boned this weekend?”

Oh, wonderful. Remus arrived to make Dee’s disdain for the day even worse.

He looked up from his lunch (which he still had yet to eat) to face the definition of chaos. Remus looked as unkempt as ever, but it was tinged with something. His smile was a little less deranged and a bit more… genuine. _Maybe_ , he thought, _it has to do with the fact that he’s “getting boned”_

“You actually managed to score a date without scaring anyone off? Wow.” Virgil smirked and took a slow bite from his sandwich, a silent cue for Remus to continue.

“Not just anyone, Tickle Me Emo! I’m going out with Patton Simmons!” Remus yelled.

Had Dee actually bothered to eat his lunch, he would have choked on it right then and there. The same could not be said for Virgil, who was trying to dislodge PB&J from his respiratory tract.

“You’re absolutely certain it wasn’t a prank or a dare? You know, considering he’s friends with Roman?” Virgil asked after he could breathe again.

“That’s about as likely as Remus taking a shower,” Dee piped up, ignoring Remus’ protests about the fact that he did, actually, take showers. “Besides, Roman may be popular, but he’s not an asshole.”

Virgil and Remus shared a pointed look, a look Deepak knew all too well. He rolled his eyes and (finally) shoved a spoonful of lemon rice in his mouth, the taste a welcome distraction from everything around him.

It wasn’t much of a secret to anyone who knew him that he had a crush on Roman. For a while, he thought he had a chance at winning Roman’s heart, but then Roman started dating the resident nerd, Logan Harris. It didn’t help that Roman and Remus were literal twins, so Dee couldn’t simply avoid Roman. Instead, he resigned himself to hopelessly crushing on Roman and hoping it would all go away after a while.

He barely registered that Remus was talking to him until he felt someone poke his arm. He fixed Remus with a glare.

“Oh great! You aren’t dead! So are you down for coming to my house today?” Remus asked, his token smile back on his face.

“What for?”

“Well, my lovely boyfriend is coming over to my house today, but Roman feels awkward third-wheeling us, so I need someone to keep him company,” Remus explained as if he wasn’t suggesting something that could flip Dee’s life upside down.

“Doesn’t he have a boyfriend to do that with?” he replied, trying and failing to keep the spite out of his voice.

“Logan’s gonna be there too!”

That settled it then. “No.”

“What why-”

“Because spending the day with my crush is one thing, but spending the day with my crush and his boyfriend is another,” he mumbled, stuffing more lemon rice in his mouth to avoid talking any further.

“Come on, DeeDee! Logan isn’t too bad, although he can get kinda boring when he goes on a rant about space. But he’s still a cool person.” It would have been much better for Remus’ case if he wasn’t talking with mouthfuls of food.

Just as Dee was about to tell Remus to leave him be, the lunch bell rang.

“Just think about it!” Remus shouted over his shoulder as he scrambled to his next class.

Deepak Srinivas had to be an idiot to even consider going to Roman’s house

**\---**

Deepak Srinivas was an idiot.

He stared up at the Mendez house. He was half tempted to just book it back home and explain to his mom that they finished hanging out early. But then that would require explaining why, and he might have been a good liar, but he definitely wasn’t in the mood to weave a story to appease his mother.

Mustering what little courage he had, he walked up to the door and rang the bell. Dee expected Remus or Roman or their dad to open the door. What he didn’t expect was for a very pretty person to open the door. He had a neutral expression, although there was a spark of curiosity behind his bespectacled eyes. All in all, he was very pretty.

“Ah. I’m assuming you are Deepak?” He spoke in a deep baritone voice, although a bit monotonous.

“Uh- yes. I am,” he sputtered out.

The boy smiled softly, and Dee swore he became 10 times gayer in that one moment. He stepped aside to let Dee inside before closing the door behind him.

“Roman’s told me a lot about you. I’m Logan by the way. Logan Harris.” So this was the guy that swept Roman off of his feet. After actually meeting him, Dee couldn’t blame Roman for dating him.

“Nice to meet you,” Dee mumbled under his breath. “Roman talks about me?”

_Tone down the gay there._

Logan chuckled before replying, “Likewise. And yes, quite a bit actually. You two seem close”

Dee wasn’t sure how to respond to that comment. Yeah, Roman and Dee were close. In fact, other than Remus and Virgil, he was the only other person Dee considered a friend. He hardly ever imagined that Roman liked Dee enough to talk about him to his boyfriend.

They walked into the living room, where Roman was curled up on the carpet, busy scribbling stuff down in a spiral notebook. Dee stood at an awkward distance away from him, meanwhile, Logan sat down next to Roman and wrapped an arm around him. Dee pretended like his heart didn’t twinge a little when Logan pressed a kiss to Roman’s hair. Part of him hoped to be the one to cuddle next to Roman as he wrote down whatever came to mind. And a much more rational part of him knew that he didn’t have a chance.

“Hi Starshine, is- DeeDee!” Roman squealed. He patted the spot on the side where Logan wasn’t curled up.

Dee rolled his eyes, but obliged nonetheless, keeping some distance between the two of them.

“Your brother is rubbing off on you,” he muttered.

After several indignant shouts, Roman flashed Dee smile that nearly sent him into a gay panic.

“I’m glad you came. It’s always lovely to be in the presence of royalty!” Roman exclaimed, shifting into the exaggerated regal voice he used when being dramatic.

“Royalty?” Logan had shifted from his position next to Roman to get a better look at Dee.

“He insists on calling me the snake king, since I love snakes, and according to him, my vitiligo looks like snake scales.”

Frankly, the nickname was sort of endearing. He always wanted to get into herpetology ever since he found out there was an actual field about studying snakes. And not a lot of people had thought to compliment him on his vitiligo.

“Hey, it works out doesn’t it?” Roman turned to Logan and gave a kiss on the nose. “He knows so many snake facts, Lo, you’d love to hear them.”

“That I would,” Logan said, the spark of curiosity ever-present in his eye igniting into a flame. “You wouldn’t mind sharing a few, would you?”

Dee felt like a deer stuck in headlights. Even Roman was looking at him, silently urging him to continue.

“Oh. Uh… well, only a small percentage of the over 3000 species of snakes are able to kill or significantly wound humans. Seven percent, to be exact.”

Dee went on a long explanation of the various types of snakes and how constriction works. Throughout all of it, Logan and Roman listened with rapt attention. It was nice, having people listen to him go on about something he was interested in. It was somehow even better when Logan chimed in occasionally to ask questions about certain things (he wondered why that made his heart flutter in his chest). The conversation shifted to other topics, but as the evening progressed, Dee found himself growing more fond of the nerd, with his passion for knowledge and his grounding presence and his gentle smile and-

Oh.

Oh fuck.

Deepak Srinivas was an idiot alright. And a gay disaster.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me: *posts this fic and makes Janus' name Deepak*  
> Thomas, literally the day after I post it: *reveals Janus' name*  
> Me: Tf am I supposed to do now?
> 
> His name will be Deepak for the rest of the fic, but just pretend his middle name is Janus for now lol.  
> Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter!

_**Thursday, March 29. Two weeks before prom** _

Remus was many things. Chaotic, insane, gruesome. A romantic was not one of them. And yet, right then, as Patton carded a hand through his unruly hair, Remus almost understood what his brother meant when he waxed poetic about falling in love. 

“We should probably head to class,” Patton murmured, pressing a kiss to his forehead. 

“Ugh, please no. Roman is in my first class and I think I might hurl if I hear him gush about Dee again,” Remus groaned, burying his head in Patton’s shoulder. 

Patton giggled, and Remus scrunched his nose at how his heart fluttered at the sound. 

“I’m tempted to lock both of them in a closet together so they confess their undying love for one another or whatever,” he grumbled, reluctantly pulling away from Patton’s embrace. 

“Does Logan know?” Patton asked, sending a cursory glance to his surroundings. 

“Rumor has it that Logan likes him too,” Remus whispered, giving his own surroundings the once over. 

The entire Logan/Roman/Deepak love-triangle was something that Remus had to deal with for a great deal of his time at high school. Well, more like one and a half years. Regardless, finding out your best friend has a crush on your brother but is too stubborn to do anything about it, and then finding out your brother had a crush not only on your best friend, but a nerdy kid from his English class is a frustrating situation to be stuck in. He had half a mind to scream “JUST FUCK ALREADY” whenever they were in the same room, but it wasn’t a given that they would fuck if the opportunity presented itself since Dee was demisexual. The whole thing only got worse after Logan confessed to Roman and they started dating. 

He pulled himself out of his brooding (teenage Tim Burton was having too much of an influence on him these days) to see Patton with his lips pursed together and his eyes twinkling with… something. 

“What’s that look for?” 

“Well… I have a plan… a plan you might be interested in.” Patton’s expression was devious, or to put it differently, completely unlike Remus had expected of him. 

“Go on,” Remus replied, thoroughly enjoying this side of his boyfriend. 

“What if we-” Patton began, but the bell cut him off. 

If it was a person Remus would have stabbed it. Although, if it was a person it would have known to shut up before Remus could stab them. 

“Text it to me. For now, I’ll just have to deal with my brother’s bullshit for an hour,” Remus griped. 

Patton nodded before flashing Remus a double-decker smile, making roses bloom in Remus’ heart. Disgusting. He watched as his boyfriend skipped off to class before turning away himself and heading for his Physics class. 

By the time he sat down in his seat, his phone buzzed with a message from Patton. 

_what if we played matchmaker for the three of them?_

_love you btw_

Remus grinned as he sent his reply. 

_i love you too_

_i’m in_

\--- 

Deepak busily scribbled down his notes for English, trying and failing not to think about the other day. As if having a crush on Roman wasn’t enough, he was falling for Logan, of all people. He barely even knew him, and yet he just had to be so annoyingly sweet and adorable and smart and- 

He yanked himself out of his thoughts. No. He couldn’t be thinking about that right now. Dee had a class to focus on, and if he didn’t want his English grade to dip below an 86, he might as well pretend like Logan didn’t exist. 

Not like he even had half a chance with Logan anyway. 

His English teacher closed out the PowerPoint and promptly sat at her desk to forgo dealing with the class for the rest of the hour (and his mother wondered why his grade in English was the lowest it had been in his entire lifetime). While everyone immediately turned to their friends and engaged in whatever shallow conversation they typically did, Dee scrolled through his Twitter feed. 

“Hey there DeeDee!” Patton chirped. 

“I don’t recall the time I said you could call me that,” he drawled, not even looking up from his phone. 

“My _dee_ pest apologies for that. It won’t happen again,” Patton teased, looking like he was holding back laughter. 

So this is why Remus was dating him. 

“Was there a point to this conversation?” He hoped that his voice conveyed how much he didn’t want to deal with Patton. 

“Oh yeah! Well, Remus told me that you’ve been struggling with English lately, and I wanted to help out!” Patton responded, his smile suspiciously wide. 

“Help out?” Something told Deepak he shouldn’t be too keen on taking up Patton’s offer, but the appeal of pulling himself out of the ditch he’d been in for the duration of junior year was hard to ignore. 

“Mhm! I mean, with the way things go in this class, I’m surprised I’m even getting a C,” Patton whispered as he glanced over at their teacher, Mrs. Clemens, who was watching cats fitting themselves into boxes with more interest than she had ever shown while teaching. 

Deepak studied Patton for a beat. Patton had no reason to help him, although that had never been a deterrent for Patton in the past when it came to others. Even then, the two of them had an unsteady acquaintance that culminated in Patton’s paternal instincts being overridden by awkward apathy. 

“Why do you want to help me in the first place?” Dee inquired. 

“Well, any pal of remus is a pal of mine!” Patton sang, and as far as Dee could tell, he seemed genuine. 

“Alright. What’s your grand plan for saving my 86?” 

“Well, I have- wait, 86? That’s pretty good! Why do you want it any higher?” He bit back a laugh at Patton’s confusion. 

Ah, the blissful ignorance of not having high expectations from one’s parents. 

“Irrelevant. Like I said, how are you going to fix my grade?” Dee dodged, pretending to push back his cuticles (purely for the aesthetic and nothing else). 

“Uh- ok well um... I actually have a student here who tutors me! He’s been a great help, and I thought, ‘who better than him!’” he responded, his smile less bright and shaded with mild concern. Concern that Deepak hardly needed to be directed towards him. 

“I have his number, if you want to check him out? Better yet, he tutors after school today in the library! I can just tell him you’re going to be there with me,” Patton commented. He promptly pulled his phone from his pocket and typed up a storm before shoving it right back. 

Well, there goes his Thursday afternoon. Not like he had better plans anyways. 

“Thank you. You really didn’t have to do this,” Deepak whispered. 

Somehow, Patton smiled even brighter. “Aw, it’s no problem! I’m always here if you need a helping hand.” 

He felt the corners of his lips tug up into the smallest of smiles. Outside of his small group of friends, not many people had given him enough consideration beyond acknowledging his existence. It was nice to know someone cared. 

“Oh! I almost forgot!,” Patton shouted, pulling his phone back out of his pocket. “Can I have your phone?” 

With mild confusion, Dee held out his phone, which Patton snatched out of his hand. He typed something into Dee’s phone before handing it back. Staring at his phone screen he saw Patton had added a new contact to his phone: English Tutor. 

“That way the two of you can talk even if he isn’t tutoring that day,” Patton remarked, although there was something almost smug behind his tone. 

Dee raised an eyebrow in confusion but said nothing more. Frankly, he was just hoping that the tutoring thing worked out for him. At least that way his life would be less of a mess 

\--- 

Logan sat in the library, finishing up the rest of his AP Calculus homework before Patton came along for tutoring. Today Patton decided to bring along a friend who needed help in English as well, a last-minute change in the usual schedule that Logan wasn’t entirely enthused about, but he’d learned to tolerate spontaneity after meeting Roman. 

He didn’t even need to see Patton to know he had arrived, as he was busy chattering away to whoever he had brought along. Logan glanced up, curious as to who he'd brought along. 

He broke out into a tentative smile when Deepak Srinivas happened to be the one staring back at him (and ignored the little fluttering in his chest at seeing him). 

And the smile left his face the moment Deepak bolted out of the library.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all hate me yet?  
> I want to apologize for the delay in posting the second chapter. The new episode came and I almost lost motivation because of the whole Janus reveal, AP exams were coming up, and then to top it all off my phone and computer got taken away for a solid month and a half.  
> Also, this fic got a lot more recognition than I expected to receive so thank you???? So much???? It's half the reason why I didn't completely lose motivation to write this.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Minor Roman angst ahead, proceed with caution  
> AKA I cannot stop being a Roman stan for five minutes and have to make him sad at some point in this story and that was now adskfhjkas

**_Wednesday April 4. One week before prom_ **

Roman was draped on the couch, staring up at his living room ceiling and pondering how his life managed to be a giant game of win one, lose the other. It was times like these that he wished Logan was around to vent to, but all he had was Remus, and recently he had been spending a lot more time with Patton.

It was equal parts adorable and vomit-inducing.

Sitting up, Roman eyed the stack of worksheets he had for homework that lay at his feet and wished his motivation would finally turn up when he needed it to. Maybe then he wouldn’t have to ask Logan for answers. He didn’t think Logan minded it much, but he still felt guilty nonetheless.

He supposed there was no point in doing his homework anyway if his mind was on other things. Especially when said thing was his crush who had begun a new habit of avoiding him completely.

He figured he should be happy, considering he still had a boyfriend who loved and cared about him, even when Roman didn’t have the energy to care about himself enough. And Logan was amazing and kind and beautiful and so many things that Roman loved.

But.

But that didn’t stop him from liking Deepak. And to make matters worse, Logan liked him too. Just his luck.

**CRASH!**

He sighed, getting up off the couch to go see what kind of havoc Remus had let loose in their shared bedroom. Roman trudged up the stairs, hoping that whatever he had to face wasn’t stinky. He recalled one time Remus had taken a carton of rotten eggs from the fridge and tried to see how many he could fit in his mouth. Needless to say, they managed to clean the carpeting, but the smell stayed for months, and Remus was forever banned from using the fridge without Roman’s supervision.

He opened the door and felt his soul leave his body.

Remus was on the floor, and so was an entire bottle of liquid Elmer’s glue. Somehow (and Roman wasn’t about to find out), Remus had snapped the bottle in half, leaving the contents to seep into the carpeting. The worst part, however, was that Remus’ ant farm had tipped over, shattering the glass and letting the gel get all over their nightstand as several hundred ants swarmed the side of the stand and many more congregated on the floor.

Just great. More things for him to tell his parents while he had to clean up the mess.

“Remus, what the hell happened this time?” Roman asked, wishing Logan were here now more than ever. He’d provide some weird factoid about how to deal with ants that have somehow managed to escape their confines, and then things would be alright again, at least partially.

Remus, unsurprisingly, was grinning from ear to ear.

“Well, I noticed the middle part of the glue bottle was really flimsy, so I tried to see if I could break it over the nightstand but-” Remus began, an excited glimmer in his eye.

“How in Zeus’ name am I going to sleep here tonight? There are literally ants crawling all over the nightstand, and pretty soon they’ll be crawling all over you and me,” Roman interjected.

“Just go have a sleepover at Logan’s place, dumbass, it’s not like he’ll mind,” Remus mumbled, now proceeding to see what would happen if the glue and gel mixed together.

“Yes he will. You know how much he hates changes to his ‘perfect schedule’.”

“He doesn’t seem to hate it when it’s you,” Remus countered. He made a motion like he was gagging at the thought.

“Oh shut up! You and Patton aren’t any better, you know?” Roman sighed. “And yeah, I know that, but I’m not pushing my luck. He’s bound to get tired of me asking favors like this sooner or later.”

That earned a curious stare from Remus.

Call it twin telepathy, because the next thing Remus asked was, “You’re thinking about Dee, aren’t you?” His voice was steady, something that terrified Roman to his core.

His lack of a response was answer enough, because Remus sighed, got up and brushed off a few ants that had crawled up his arm, and grabbed Roman by the elbow and dragged them out of their room.

“Wha-! Unhand me this instant, you fiend!” Roman shouted as Remus dragged them both carelessly downstairs.

“Nope. I’m driving you to Dee’s house. And if you want to keep your toes at night, you won’t complain,” Remus stated, the even tone in his voice never leaving.

Roman’s terror doubled.

“No! Why his house? Why not, like, Patton’s house or something?” Roman whined, desperately trying to pull out of Remus’ stone grip.

“What did I say about complaining?” Remus had pulled them to the garage.

Roman finally yanked his arm out of Remus’ grasp.

“Remus, you aren’t my personal fucking Cupid, alright? Just- just let it go…” Roman snapped. 

Tears pushed at the back of his eyes and he clenched his jaw to keep from breaking out into sobs. Because it was pointless anyways. Deepak was probably avoiding him for a reason.

“And what? Watch you mope about your crush because he won’t pull his head out of his ass and talk to you? Oh no, I’m going there, and you’re coming with me or I will replace all of your Disney posters with hentai scenes.” As far as he could tell, Remus was serious.

Roman didn’t know when he started crying, but he was crying nonetheless. He rubbed at his eyes, simultaneously hating and loving his brother. He yanked the keys from Remus’ hand and held up a hand when he protested.

“At least let me drive. I’d like to get to Dee’s house in one piece,” Roman mumbled, pulling himself into their sedan.

Remus jumped into the passenger’s seat, his token manic grin back on his face.

“Lead the way, your gayness.”

\---

Of all the things Dee expected when he opened the door, it definitely wasn’t Roman and Remus. Part of him wanted to book it to his room, just like he did when he saw Logan in the library, but Remus looked calm, and a calm Remus typically meant that he was seething.

Which meant that Deepak had to actually face the two of them to avoid dying at age sixteen.

He sighed. The universe really wanted him to suffer, didn’t it?

“And to what do I owe this absolute pleasure, Remus?” Dee asked. He made a point not to look either of the twins in the eye.

“Well, my brother over here is afraid of ants crawling all over him, for some reason, and so he’s planning to stay the night with you!” Remus declared, his voice holding all the usual intonation that contrasted greatly with the steely calm of his facial expression.

Deepak ran a hand through his hair, sighing once more. He didn’t think his mom would mind, but she was also still managing the restaurant, and he doubted she would be all-too-pleased that he had invited friends over.

“And how many ants are we talking about here?” He chanced a glance over at Roman, who was pointedly looking at the floor.

“I did knock over the entire ant farm, and the queen is probably still loose so-”

“I can just sleep on our couch, it’s fine,” Roman piped up. “Sorry to bother you Deepak.”

“No!” Deepak shouted, shocking himself as well.

Remus was biting back a grin, and Dee fought back the urge to glare at him.

“Uh- you two can sleep here. It’s ok. I just have to tell my mom,” he mumbled, stepping aside to let the twins in.

The corners of Roman’s mouth quirked up into a small smile as he walked through the door. Dee raised an eyebrow at Remus, but he stayed outside, and his expression could only be described as shit-eating.

“I never did say that I was coming, did I?” _I’m going to kill him someday,_ Deepak thought.

“I’ll be back to drop off good old Ro-Ro’s homework. Don’t do anything too fun while I’m gone!”

Before he could protest, Remus had already made a mad dash for his car.

Deepak closed the door, rubbing at his temples.

This was going to be a long night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Deepak is Not Happy TM. But neither is Roman.  
> Who knows, if they get together, then they might plot Remus's murder together?  
> Sorry that I took a while to write this chapter. It was originally gonna be a lot longer, but as I kept writing I figured that I would post the first "half" and then finish the second part later since I was shoving too much into one chapter.  
> Thank you all so much for reading and commenting, it really makes my day!

**Author's Note:**

> Can you tell that I'm projecting onto Dee?  
> Kudos and comments are appreciated.


End file.
